Christian Hero Worship

There are different flavors of ice cream and everyone thinks their ice cream is the best. I’m glad if a person thinks their church and pastor is the best. I am not called to recruit people to church or my flavor of ice cream. I am called to make disciples of Jesus. My calling has always been evangelist so what church a person decides to go to is their own choosing. I am just interested to see if they have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I have gotten people to go back to church who quit going, but what flavor of ice cream they decide is their own business. There are certain flavors I recommend at times.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Matthew 28:19

We are to “accept” one another although you like vanilla ice cream and I like chocolate.

Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. Romans 15:7

I was charismatic and my husband was Presbyterian and we got along fine in our marriage. I personally like several Presbyterian churches where my in-laws attend and went to all their life and my husband was raised Presbyterian, because when they have mission sign up day they called me to see if I wanted to start a spousal loss group, come with them to the prisons and join their digital media team in making video productions for children. Although, I’m not into the more traditional style of worship, but like more contemporary worship, I like their evangelistic outreaches. I lead worship for a single’s group for the last three years, so let’s just say I appreciate that flavor of ice cream at times. It was another outreach for a season.

One of the biggest Christian hero worships I ran into is when I was 21 years old was the faith message. I was in Jacksonville, Florida at the time, and the church I attended was in the faith movement. Christians would stand for hours to talk to Kenneth Copeland or get his autograph on a piece of paper. It was like they wanted to touch him. It can be that way with race car drivers, rock stars or Hollywood stars. We see that many times that even children wanted to touch Jesus, so I’m not against touching people. Maybe a spiritual impartation or blessing can come at times and we see this with the apostles. The shadow of Peter healed people (Acts 5:15). Isaac blessed his sons Esau and Jacob.

One problem I see with this is Jesus was so busy as just one person anyone was lucky to ever get close to him. The woman with the issue of blood had to press through a crowd of people, a man who was let down through Peter’s roof to be healed (cut a hole in the roof) and the Gentile women that the disciples tried to prevent her from seeing Jesus when her daughter was ill. Same way with most mega church pastors. I can see why in James says to “call for the elders of the church to anoint us with oil and pray for the sick.” The elder of my friend’s daughter church came to the hospital and prayed for her with cancer. James 5:14

Pastors don’t have that kind of time to pray for everyone and neither does Kenneth Copeland. Jesus died and one of the purposes of him dying was to send the gift of the Holy Spirit inside of each and every one of us. When I get sick, I lay hands on myself –the Bible says if we lay hands on the sick “they will recover.” I’m exercising faith on my own self for healing.

And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you. Romans 8:11

Last weekend, I kept hearing this scripture in my mind:

Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. Ephesians 5:17

It reminds me of the parable of the foolish virgins who wanted to get oil from others. They were virgins so they were not believers contaminated with this world’s pollution, but when the bridegroom came to greet them, their oil ran out in their lamp, they went to buy oil and they missed out. I believe it’s a scripture that we can’t live on our parent’s spiritual coat tails, our pastor’s spiritual coat tails, Kenneth Copeland’s anointing, or other people’s prayers, we have to have our own oil in our lamps as far as our own intimate prayer and walk with the Lord. Our own close fellowship and study of His word. Mathew 25:1-10 (Five of them were foolish and five were wise. he foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them.)

I don’t know if you ever got into hero worship, but I think what happens is God eventually opens our eyes to a person’s faults, and then when we realize that every man puts his pants on just like anyone else. It can be secular hero worship or worship of God’s leaders. Even when someone came to Jesus and said he was good, Jesus said that only God is good,

"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good--except God alone. Luke 18:19

Jesus was always giving glory to God, he was not into self-glory. But when it came to his purpose of being a king, he was the son of God and he knew who he was and the Jews got it right. They killed him for blaspheme. He never said he was just a prophet or a good man. God is always honoring Jesus (This is my beloved son in who I am well pleased Matthew 3:17), and the Holy Spirit is always pointing to Jesus. It’s hard at times to understand that God is in three persons, but they are always exalting each other. At the end of time, Jesus is going to hand over the kingdom to God the Father.

For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 1 Cor. 15:22-24

One of my hero worships was Phil Collins who sang romantic love songs. When he went through a divorce and I went to hear him in concert with my husband at Verizon, and he constantly used the “f” word and he talked about getting a woman back stage who he could “f” that really did it for my hero worship of a musician. I remember when I was a teenager, I liked the Beatles. I know some Christians worshiped Sandi Patty and Amy Grant and when they went through a divorce, than the hero worship stopped.

Church is made up of sinners. We all need the blood of Christ and prayer daily.

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. 1 John 1:7